The Steering Committee for Human Rights (CDDH), set up by the Committee of Ministers end 1976, is composed of experts representing the forty-seven member States of the Council of Europe. Other experts, in particular Representatives from the civil society attend also these meetings. The Steering Committee conducts the intergovernmental work of the Council of Europe in the human rights field in the light, in particular, of the Council of Europe legal standards and the relevant jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. It advises and gives its legal expertise to the Committee of Ministers on all questions within its field of competence.

Under the supervision of the CDDH, the Committee of Experts on the system of the European Convention on Human Rights (DH-SYSC) conducts the intergovernmental work intended to enhance the protection of human rights by improving the effectiveness of the control mechanism of the European Convention on Human Rights and the implementation of the latter at national level.